Iran Supreme Leader Defends Election Results

People attending the Friday Prayer at Tehran University. (Photo obtained by The Epoch Times)

Iran’s Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, during the Friday Prayer in Tehran, defended the presidential election results and the incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, amid continued controversy over whether the election results were rigged.

Khamenei’s speech comes after a week of protests and rallies calling for a new election, and the death of seven Iranians amidst clashes between the riot police and pro-Mousavi supporters.

Reformer Mir Hossein Mousavi, prime minister of Iran from 1981-1989, (before the post was eliminated by constitutional amendment,) was hardline conservative Mamhoud Ahamdinejad’s main opponent in the Iranian presidential elections.

Khamenei spoke very sharply towards pro-Mousavi protesters, and suggested it is impossible to rig the 11 million vote difference between Ahmadinejad and Mousavi.  He also suggested that his views are closer to the current President. 

“If this issue does not end, the responsibility lies on the sponsors and organizers,” Khamenei said, adding that the “behind-the-scene” protest organizers will be responsible for any bloodshed. 

 

The Friday Prayer was attended by tens of thousands of people at the Tehran University. Buses bringing people from all around Iran could be seen at the site.  Many pre-printed posters and leaflets with pictures of Iran’s leaders and current president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad were distributed among the crowd. 

Shortly after Khamenei’s talk, Mehdi Karroubi, the other reformist candidate who received only a fraction of the votes according to the government-released election results, repeated his request for the annulment of the election in a statement. Mousavi has not made a statement so far.  

Some of the reformist supporters had initially planned to attend the Friday Prayer wearing dark clothing in sign of mourning the protest casualties; however, the plan was cancelled.

Another protest is scheduled for Saturday around the Azadi Square once again, with tensions running high after Khamenei’s most sharply worded public address since his initial endorsement of the election results on June 13th.

Cell phone communications remains spotty, with SMS, the main source of communication amongst the Iranian youth, completely blocked since early after the announcement of the election results last week. Many social networking sites including facebook have also been filtered however Iranians can still access those using antifilters, though at lower speeds. 

Following Khamenei’s remarks, European leaders including British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, French President Nicolas Sarkozy, and German Chancellor Angela Merkel as well as Amnesty International, condemned the threat of crackdown on the protesters.

The U.S. House of Representatives also adopted a resolution to condemn “the ongoing violence against demonstrators by the government of Iran and pro-government militias.”